EMDR is an evidence-based therapeutic approach that helps people process traumatic memories. It involves bilateral stimulation, which is a fancy way of saying it involves gentle back-and-forth movements. This might look like small hand buzzers that buzz back-and-forth between each hand, or a light bar moving side-to-side while a person tracks it with their eyes. This bilateral stimulation helps people reprocess the experience and can provide a release from the emotional grip of this distressing memory.

Oftentimes, trauma symptoms show up unexpectedly. You might be strolling through a park or walking through the grocery store and suddenly feel like you’re back in the moment where something awful happened. Your heart races, your chest tightens, and your body reacts as if you’re in danger again. You might even feel like you are the age when the traumatic experience happened, even if it’s been decades since.

I find it genuinely insulting how much sleep humans need. The wellness checklist always starts off reasonable: eat healthy, drink water, exercise, nurture your relationships… but the moment some professional casually tacks on, “Oh, and get an amazing, uninterrupted, eight hours of sleep per night,” I feel my body tense, a reaction I get when I feel the need to defend myself. Did an alien who has never struggled to fall asleep write this list? Can we get some empathy on this one, please? We have endless data and articles reminding us about how important sleep is, but when it comes to realistic ways to actually fall asleep… crickets. Which is ironic, because that sound would probably knock half of us out cold.